A STRANGE theory, indeed, is the idea that the people may not participate in church worship without being specially authorized to do so by some authorized form or ritual prescribed by some authorized body. If a pastor, or other person chosen to conduct a church service, is not authorized to take the congregation into partnership in the worship, and the people can not have a part in the services without the leader's being authorized by some other body to allow them to take part in the exercises of worship, what has become of the liberty of the Gospel? It is certainly an erroneous idea of worship to suppose that a congregation must have a form of words furnished by fallible men before they can engage in orderly, acceptable worship. The present tendency toward liturgical, or formal, worship is pointed out by the Christian Work:—
From time to time the mail brings to our notice the fact that churches here and there are adopting for use the Forms of Worship tentatively presented to the General Assembly last May by Dr. Henry van Dyke's committee, and by it approved. It is by no means surprising that these churches do not consent to wait until the work of that committee is completed, and its recommended forms adopted as well as approved by some future Assembly. The imperative demand of Presbyterianism for some liturgical form, became clear as day when Dr. van Dyke presented his report, showing that some seventy per cent. of Presbyterian churches already use forms of one sort or another, and that ninety-four per cent. of 2,001 Presbyterian ministers who responded to inquiry are on record as of being of opinion that "the people should participate in the service of the sanctuary." This being the case, an authorized liturgy is imperative.
Wherever it becomes recognized as a fact that an "authorized liturgy is imperative" in church worship, it will be an indisputable fact that the true spirit of worship can not be the leading influence in that worship. The strong tendency in that direction on the part of professed Protestants in these last days, of various sects, is the indication of a Romeward march. It all originated in Rome. God has authorized all men to worship Him in spirit and in truth; but He has not authorized any class of men to authorize worshiping bodies to use any special formality to the exclusion of voluntary or varied forms. The assumption of the authority to authorize is an assumption of authority to forbid—to dictate in general. Such a spirit has no place in the Christian church. A form of worship based on human authority is not the worship of the true God. It is a "form of godliness" without the power.